Los Angeles daily herald., 1887-09-10
DAILY HERALD.
FRENCH WOMEN.
Net Frivolous, but HelPmates I'm
the True sense Of the Word.

dren is perfect, and she leads her hus
band by the nose. He does not com
plain Of this; on the contrary he en-
lows it. and he thinks that, after all
much worse might happen him. The
wife knows all her husbands affairs
and when he has few savings to in
vest he does not think it beneath hin
TO ask her advice. She knows as wei
AZ he the current price of stocks at ths
Bourse, and if he should be seized will
q pruriency to embark in speculation
she brings to bear all her influences
over him to buy consols o.
any other government securi
ties. Call on her husband OF
business, and if he is from home yor
will not have to make second visi
on that account. She has all the
affairs of the firm at her fingers end
Every housekeeper keeps a memoran
dunn book in which she writes down
all her expenses.
The French woman has genius
for cookery. and is thoroughly awake
to the fact that it is good policy in
married life to see that her husband
dimes well. The politics OF matrimony
Is a science inborn in our women. Let
a French woman be rich or poor the
mistress of mansion in the Champs
Elysees, or of poor fifth-hoor
little fat at Montmartre or
Batignolles-she has always the
charm of feminality. She is
always smart, always alert, and has
. little fluttering, bustling way about
her that is bound to keep awake your
interest in all she does. She may be
sometimes little affected, but she is
never vulgar. On Sundays and holi-
days she dresses still little more
elegantly than usual, but she never
appears to be in Sunday clothes. The
middle-class French woman is lady
like, not only in her dress, but in her
speech. You will never see her
loaded with cheap jewelry, this great
stamp Of vulgarity, and when she
speaks to you, you cannot guess
whether she is the wife of gentle
man or of small tradesman.
/ have often heard French women
called frivolous. But this is the
height of absurdity. If frivolity con-
ssists in trying to remain young and
attractive as long as possible, then the
French bourgeois is frivolous. If,
again, frivolity consists in making a
home cheerful and gay, and prevent
ing a husband being absorbed by the
cares of business. then she is frivo-
lOus., If this woman was frivolous,
how could you explain the alteration
for the mother which, even to the
lowest of the low, you find in French
children? How could this be unless
she were the example Of all domestic
virtues? If a Frenchman of 40 would
hesitate to take an important step
in life without first consulting his
mother surely it must be that he rec
sognizes in her wise guide. 1t would
be no mere naivete on my part to
dwell longer ON the absurd charge Of
of frivolity. Take now the shopkeep-
ing class. There you will see the wife
the active partner Of her husband.
Behold them both as the commercial
traveller displays his goods on the
counter. She is not a mere house
keeper, with or without wages; she is
a partner, not merely sleeping part
ner. This not only enables her, if she
happens to become widow, to carry
on the business without her husband,
but to be Independent, and to bring up
her children. She has not, to obtain
her living on her husbands death, to
become working housekeeper or a
nurse she is the mistress of her own
house, as before, and now the head OF
the firm.
You cannot obtain perfect notion
>e D~~nk, Oh rvvxtnCc a
visit to our peasantry. l must say
that now the woman ceases to be at
tractiye. She does not even attempt
to look so. Sunburnt, hale and hearty
behold her, dear English tourist, who
is the fortune of France. She does
not wear fringes on her forehead,
will admit, she does not wear 1ounces
on secondhand skirt, or hat witt
flowers or feathers, and she totally
ignores one-franc diamonds. She ha
. coarse serge gown on and simple
snowy cap. She is clean and tidy
and the personi6cation of industry
l do not doubt, however, that, thank
to the blessing OF gratuitous and com
pulsory education, the time will com,
when she will want to initiate tn,
town in her habits and dress, and tina
her sons will despise the dear lant
where they were born, and will al
want to be clerks and swagger in tow
with high stand-up collars, tigh
trousers, and sticks. Thank good
ness, this spectacle is not yet to b.
seen in France.
This good, hard-working, thrifty
woman is the backbone of the country
The amount OF work she can ge
through is simply prodigious. You
will always see her busy, either work
ing in her field, selling the produce o.
her little farm in the market place O.
the nearest town, or engaged about
her little household. She is not at
tractive, but she is picture of health
and contentment. Shares or bonds
may 60 up or down without disturb.
ing her peace; she holds none. She
trusts her savings to nobody. Bank
ers, she thinks, company directors
and stockholders may be very re-
spectacle persons, but when the old
stocking is swollen with fve-franC
pieces, she rounds off her little family
domain and buys a new field, some
thing she is quite sure to find in its
place when she wakes up in the morn
ing.
Let me give you an example Of hel
frugality, and allow me to take it from
a personal recollection. My mother
has housemaid who has been will
her twenty-five years. Not long ago
while in France, took aside this OLE
servant.
81 know how devoted you hav
been to my mother l said. "Yo1
are not strong, and l dare say you viii
not wish to go into service again bu
make yourself easy about this. If any
thing should happen to my mother,
shall see that you are comfortable fo
the rest of your life. But" l said, ir
quiringly, II have no doubt you hav
something Of your own by this time :?